


The Strength Of The Soul

by mitkit99



Category: Captain America (Movies), Doctor Strange (2016), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Bruce Wayne is a Nolan & Affleck Crossover Because I Can't Decide Which I Like, Child Abuse, Erik Killmonger Grows up in Wakanda, F/M, Female Tony Stark, James "Rhodey" Rhodes & Tony Stark Friendship, James "Rhodey" Rhodes is a Good Bro, Male Christine Everhart, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Partially Nolan Movie Compliant But Will Have DCEU Canon Mixed, Princess Tony Stark, Relationships Listed Are Final Relationships, Tony Is Adopted By T'Chaka, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark is Good With Kids, Tony Stark is So Done, Tony Stark is the Soul Stone
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-14
Updated: 2019-05-31
Packaged: 2019-06-27 05:40:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 11,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15679122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mitkit99/pseuds/mitkit99
Summary: The Fates chose one soul to be entwined with the soul stone. The person they chose just so happens to be soulmates with the protector of the time stone.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Infinity Wars is possibly the greatest Marvel movie yet but there were a few things that bugged me. The number one thing being the soul stone.  
> I screamed at Red Skull's appearance and his punishment makes sense but what he said and what happened after seemed weird.  
> The soul stone is arguably the most important of the six. You would think there would be some sort of test to prove how worthy you are so someone corrupt wouldn't walk away from it. The test shown in the movie seems to have the opposite results expected. You would think that by Thanos' willingness to sacrifice Gamora, the one thing his twisted self loves, he would prove how unworthy he was and be refused the stone.   
> So I don't like the way things happened and decided to do it differently. I personally love the theory about Tony being the soul stone and there are so few stories that I have found with that arc. So I decided to do my own.   
> The movie also relit my IronStrange fire so that is the endgame for this.

In the beginning of time, when the universe was formed, six elemental crystals went to different parts of the universe.

Each stone represented a different part of creation and if combined, could have the power to do anything. All these stones were powerful and were sought after by evil and power-hungry beings who sought to use their power for their own purposes.

Five of the six stones were hidden in the known universe but the sixth, the soul stone, was hidden by the Fates. Using their knowledge, they chose one soul in existence who was worthy of carrying the soul stone as a part of them.

After hearing of the plan, people searched for millennia to find the one lucky person who had so much power at their fingertips, but the person was never found.

Eventually, certain planets and races forgot about the stones and the soul stone legend. They focused more on science then magic.

During this time, the Fates sent the stone to their chosen bearer. This soul was a human female, born on Earth, and was the only person strong enough to carry the stone.

The sorcerers of the planet, who had found and were guarding the Time Stone, read portents that let them know that the bearer was on their planet, but they could not locate her.

But still, on August 24, 1988 at 5 PM in New York, she was born.

The soul stone had arrived.


	2. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Antonia Stark From Birth to Age 15.

Antonia Eloisa Stark was born in Long Island New York at 5 PM on August 24, 1988.

Her father, millionaire genius Howard Stark, was not there, gone on a search for Captain America. The second he found out he was having a daughter as his only child he fucked off to look for his proudest creation, the frozen super soldier.

Her mother, Maria Carbonell-Stark, had been forced to marry her father, blackmailed using her family’s secrets. She had tried several times to get pregnant since her marriage, but each ended in a miscarriage. Antonia was her last chance.

Despite her absentee husband, she was not alone in the hospital. Antonia’s godparents and other member of their family were there including Peggy Carter-Sousa, Daniel Sousa, Nick Fury, Edwin Jarvis, and James Ross. James’ wife and Edwin’s sister, Ana, was back at the mansion with her toddler three-year-old son, Everett.

It was a long and painful labor but at last Antonia was born with dark brown eyes and a tuff of dark brown hair. The shortened her name to Annie, claiming Antonia was too long for such a tiny child.

The girl grew up quick at the mansion, always faster than everyone around her. She was crawling, walking, and talking faster than any other child they knew. She was infinitely curious and smarter than other children as well.

It wasn’t until she was almost four, that Maria started to know that the girl had inherited her father’s brains. She was playing a pattern on the mansion’s piano and missed a note and her daughter as able to tell her what not she missed and the correct note.

Six months later, she completed her first circuit board out of Howard’s old junk pile. The media praised the child, utterly baffled at the prodigy. She was put under the spotlight and tested repeatedly.

The attention only grew when at six, she made her first engine.

While she still learned dancing, singing, instruments, and other typical things upper classed little girls grew up learning, she also seemed to delve into the world of mechanics and engineering.

But she was growing up too fast thanks to the press and Howard’s drunken and abusive rages.

Maria finally forced a break when the girl was seven, taking her to see the orphaned son of and old friend of hers. Martha Wayne and her husband Thomas had left behind a handsome young boy by the name of Bruce Wayne who was looked after by the family butler, Alfred Pennyworth. Though he was about three years older than Annie, they got along quite well.

He introduced her to other children from the Gotham area including Alexander Luthor, Harold Jordan, Oliver Queen, Dinah Lance, and Rachel Dawes. The entire group became quite close growing up, though Luthor seemed to always be a little standoffish. 

The first time Annie met death, she was ten. Daniel Sousa, the husband of her godmother Peggy Carter, died of cancer. She flew over to England with her family and said goodbye. The night after the funeral, she dreamed he came to tell her goodbye, but she never told anyone.

Annie flew through school and graduated high school at the age of thirteen. That fall, she was accepted and started at MIT.

There, she discovered the life of a teenager and young adult, though she mostly focused on classes. After being heckled by some kids in the halls, she met, eighteen-year-old James Rhodes who she started calling Rhodey. He took her home one weekend and introduced her to his mother, Roberta. The older woman spent the entire visit trying to stuff food down her throat.

At the end of the school year, she created her first robot. DUMMY was supposed to be a helping hand, but he was an idiot. She was still praised him being able to work as a beginning artificial intelligence.

Her second year, at fifteen, was when things started to become interesting. She grew up and started becoming a beautiful young woman.

She had her first boyfriend in the beginning of second semester. She broke up with him after he started pressuring her to sleep with him.

At the end of the year, she tried again with the robot and built U who worked much better than DUMMY. He had a little bit more personality and was praised even more.

That summer, things started to go downhill.

Howard pulled Annie into his office and told her about his plan. He had worked out an arrangement with a friend of his. She was to date and eventually marry Tiberius Stone, so Stone could take over his company, Stark Industries, when Howard died.

She screamed and raged and refused, causing Howard to beat the shit out of her. Eventually she was forced to agree to keep him from killing her.

That fourth of July, about two or three weeks after she and Stone had started officially dating, Everett, her childhood confidant and secret crush, took her to a secluded cliff off the coast of the Atlantic. They sat there and talked for hours about everything, including her shitty dating life.

“I just wanted to be in young and in love. Howard hates me enough that he wants someone else to take over his company and I’m his ticket to it. I want my life back and I want the freedom to choose who I want.” She whispered, staring at the waves.

Ev looked at her for a moment. “Who do you want?”

She turned her stare to his face, looking into his bright blue/green eyes. “Do you really want to know? Do you promise not to freak out?”

He nodded, and she leaned over and kissed him and he kissed her back. How could he not? He had been in love with her since before she left for college.

They went back to the mansion later, they had to, but after agreeing to keep their relationship a secret. They planned to run off when she was eighteen, to run and be able to get married.

But that would never be. How could it? Fate had a bigger plan for Antonia Eloisa Stark, one that no one could have foreseen.


	3. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Antonia Stark at Age 16.

School started back just as always.

Annie balanced out her life with a blend of school, Everett, and Stone. The public knew she and Everett and had grown up together so him visiting her at college didn’t cause too many suspicions. She went to public functions with Stone and bit back her tongue and pretended to be his dutiful girlfriend.

Rhodey knew the truth, as did her mother, Jarvis, Uncle Nick, Aunt Peggy, and Everett’s parents. She told Bruce over the phone as well and started smiling at the fact that he was surprised it took so long.

He knew her too well.

That Christmas, when Howard fucked off to go look for Captain America again, she and the whole family went to Gotham to celebrate. They spent all the holiday break there, laughing and just being free.

It ended right before MIT started back, and it was the last time Antonia Stark was purely happy for a long time.

Bruce and the others, besides Lex who had left the group years ago, had hugged her when she left like always, but it seemed more bitter sweet. It was weird.

But she didn’t realize then that the goodbye they were saying was supposed to be permanent. Supposed to be and would be for quite a while.

It wasn’t until March that she officially concluded that they didn’t care anymore. By then, it had been roughly two months of unanswered phone calls and returned letters. The news said Bruce had fucked off to who knew where and had left no plans to return.

Rhodey held her in her dorm room while she cried, confused and hurt that her brother, her unofficial twin, didn’t want her anymore and neither did her childhood friends.

She was in a funk after that, going through the days as a robot. It got bad enough that Rhodey called Everett to come visit.

It was spring break when he came. The first day they spent hanging out in their dorms, just talking about everything and nothing.

The next night was the night everything fell apart. Rhodey got a bunch of wine coolers and Everett brought beer and they all started drinking and partying in the dorm. The entire dormitory was throwing a party, so they eventually left the room to go join them.

It was there that Everett and Annie, drunk off their asses, forgot their number one rule. But how were they to know that someone would take a picture of them kissing and that it would somehow find its way into the press?

It didn’t matter because the next morning Howard was calling and screaming at her, calling her a whore and a slut. Her mother was crying, and they were forced to return to the mansion.

Howard dragged her to his office and away from Everett the second they walked into the door. He screamed and thrashed, throwing everything in reach. Stone had apparently seen the picture and had called off all plans, refusing to be with ‘the cheating slut’.

Howard had lost it, apparently more than a little drunk and beat the ever-living shit out of her, slamming her into walls and the corner of his desk.

Fury and James had eventually broken in and restrained him long enough for Everett to get her out and take her to the hospital. The press was fed a story of how she had been in a fight and had fallen down the stairs at the mansion.

While she was in surgery, Howard threatened Everett, warning him that if he didn’t flee town the next time he got his hands-on Antonia he would kill her.

Everett waited till she woke up before going back to the house and packing his things. He left a letter explaining that he knew Howard was serious and would kill her and he loved her and wouldn’t see her hurt.

She cried for the rest of the break. When she got out of the hospital and went back to school, she built her third robot, Butterfingers, a feisty two-handed robot that she channeled all her anger at Howard into.

An anger that would only grow.

Shortly after finishing her junior year at MIT, Howard sent James Ross on an undercover SHIELD mission with the CIA agents that sometimes helped the agency. Agents Mary & Richard Parker had been around often enough while Annie was growing up, so she was comfortable around them. She had babysat their four-year-old son Peter during the summers when she was home.

By the end of June, they had all been discovered and were killed because Howard had not kept them informed well enough.

Peter Benjamin Parker was orphaned and clung to Annie at the funeral for his parents. He was now going into Richard’s brother and sister-in-law’s custody. May and Ben promised she could come visit him whenever she wanted to.

The funeral for James, the man that had gone from her mother’s bodyguard to her should have been father-in-law, was horrible for many reasons. Howard didn’t show up. Ana was barely functioning and Everett, who she hadn’t seen since he had left, was close to breaking down.

She met up with him after everyone had left.

“He did this because of us.” He whispered.

She was standing next to him, close enough to feel his body heat but not close to touch him without meaning to. Their eyes were both staring at the coffin.

“He sent my father and the Parkers to their deaths because he hated us, Annie. Peter is now orphaned, my father is dead, and my mother is a widow now.”

She couldn’t do more than nod because he was right, and it hurt more than anything.

“I don’t think there is ever going to be a future for us. I wanted one, thought that after you turned eighteen and were legal we could run away from all of this but now… Now I don’t think we can ever be together and not think about this, think about what Howard did because of us.”

She agreed. “I know.” It was over. There was nothing else to say.

He turned her to face him. “I love you. That hasn’t changed.”

She nodded. “I know.”

He leaned down and closed the distance between their mouths and kissed her. It was bittersweet, both knowing it would be their last. When he pulled away he put his forehead against hers for a moment before moving to kiss her head and walk off.

She watched him go with a sad smile before turning to the coffin of James Ross. “I’m sorry and thank you, for everything.” And with that, she walked away but not without feeling a comforting presence that almost felt like James. She shrugged it off though, thinking she was crazy.

She had to be.


	4. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Antonia Stark from Age 17 to Age 20.

Annie turned seventeen to more pain and more death.

Now in her final year of college, things seemed to keep falling apart at home while she excelled at school. DUMMY, U, and BUTTERFINGERS, gained her recognition by everyone and she was spending most of her time she had outside of classes at seminars, showing them off. It was good way to get her mind off the bad things.

That is, till late September when Ana Jarvis, the woman who should have been her aunt, collapsed. She had a brain aneurism and it had killed her before she could make it to the hospital.

Annie went home from school to find a weeping Jarvis, her grieving mother, and her missing father. Rhodey stood by her side at the funeral and she didn’t say a word to Everett who tried to fight the tears she saw kept coming.

When she got home, she threw a vase everything in sight at the walls of her workshop, screaming and crying and cursing at fate for causing this.

She went back to school withdrawn and with a hard heart. Only Rhodey or the bots could make her smile.

That was, till Halloween.

One of the fraternities hosted a costume part. Rhodey went as a gladiator and she went as a Greek goddess. The cold Massachusetts air didn’t even bother her, despite the thin costume and the amount of skin showing.

Annie had been leaning against a wall alone when they met. Rhodey had disappeared into the crowd for more drinks and hadn’t come back. He had walked over, dressed in only a pair of ratty old jeans and a large red magnet with cats attached to it, showing off his abs and his scarred bumps. “Hey gorgeous.”

She looked at him up and down. The dread locks were pulled back from his face and his dark brown eyes seemed to gleam with mischief, as did his smirk. His costume was ridiculous, but she still found the energy to throw a barb at him. “I don’t care you’re a cat person. I’m not sleeping with you.”

He broke out laughing. “Spitfire, you have no idea about the cat thing.” He held out a hand. “Erik Stevens but people call me Killmonger.”

She stared at it for a moment before taking it. “Antonia Stark. People call me Annie.”

He looked at her with a raised eyebrow. “You don’t look like an Annie. I’m going to call you Toni.”

She twisted the nickname around in her head for a minute, thinking it over. “I can deal with that.”

Five minutes later, after Rhodey had joined them, all three left the house laughing and drunk off their asses. They all crashed in Rhodey’s dorm and broke into his emergency booze collection that she, at only seventeen, wasn’t technically supposed to have.

Not that anyone gave a shit.

She had Erik in one of her engineering classes it turned out. They spent hours ranting about their shitty professor and the fact that if they teamed up, they both could teach that class a million times better.

Their friendship grew from that night. If she wasn’t hanging out with Rhodey or the bots, she was with Erik.

Then Thanksgiving came, and she realized Erik, was a fucking prince. He introduced her to his cousin, the crown prince of Wakanda, and his uncle, the king. They invited her to their country for the summer, despite her father’s bad record, and she met not only T’Challa and T’Chaka, but Queen Ramonda and Princess Shuri. The technology had her only a practical high and she spent the week training with the Dora Milaje. Through T’Challa, she met Nakia, Okoye, and W’Kabi. The latter wasn’t particularly fond of her, grew to the fact she was an outsider, but didn’t cause any problems.

After her return to the States, she finished the semester off quickly and went home, hoping to spend some time with her mother, only to find out Howard was driving them to Washington DC for some stupid meeting at the Pentagon. She cursed up a storm and fought her bastard father with all she could. He screamed right back, smacking her hard across the face more than once. Eventually they left, early.

Two days later, early on December 22, 2005, Jarvis came into her workshop and gave her a grave look that sent her heart into her stomach.

Obadiah met them in the hospital and was there when she identified the bodies. Howard’s face was a bloody mess and bruises were around her mother’s neck that was twisted at an unnatural angle.

She made it into the hallway before she started crying, running to the phone and calling Bruce. He didn’t answer, exactly like she thought he would, but she sobbed into the phone anyway. Jarvis pulled her away and led her into a chair before calling Peggy who was already on her way. He then called one more person.

He called Rhodey.

Rhodey and his mother showed up a few hours later. Her best friend made his way to her and she sobbed into his chest, shaking and not caring. Her mother was gone for good. He passed her off to his mother when Roberta got done talking to Jarvis and Uncle Nick and went to the phone, calling and screaming at Bruce’s answering machine. He eventually hung up before calling Erik.

Brave, sarcastic, and goofy Erik, who flew over from Wakanda with his aunt and uncle just in time for the funeral which was two days after Christmas. She stood between Jarvis and Aunt Peggy, dressed in solid black, with a stony face, not giving the tabloids the sobbing little girl they wanted for their fucked-up stories.

Fuck them all.

When she got back to the mansion, she sat on the couch, practically in Rhodey’s lap with Erik running his hands through her hair, while the adults went to the library. When they came out, they all looked anxious.

Uncle Nick took her hands and looked into her eyes. “I have to leave, Nia, and I don’t know when I’ll be back. Howard left me as the head of SHIELD. He had a lot of enemies that may go after you and I must go take care of them. If I don’t, you could get hurt.”

She understood, and hugged him, knowing she was losing him, if only for a little while.

He left, and Jarvis spoke up. “Annie, as much as I hate it, you’re only seventeen. Howard didn’t leave any info on who gets custody so there is a chance the state or Stane can claim you.”

She gulped. “I sense a but.”

Ramonda shot a glance at her husband. “We want to adopt you.”

Annie felt her eyes widen. “What?”

The king of Wakanda approached her and sat on the couch next to her. Rhodey’s grip around her shoulders went slack as T’Chaka took her hands. “We want to adopt you. You’re a very bright girl, Antonia and you fit so well with our family. The people in my council keep asking when you will return. We want to take care of you.”

“You can still live here, Annie.” Jarvis spoke up. “We worked out an arrangement that puts me as your temporary guardian when you come home. You would just spend most of your summer in Wakanda.”

She looked at both royals, both her best friends, her godmother, and her father in everything but blood. Finally, she nodded. “Okay.”

The next day, they filed for custody. The state wanted to keep everything quiet, so no one really knew about it. Within a week, she was officially a princess of Wakanda.

The people of the African country she now belonged to loved her. Even W’Kabi greeted her with a smile and a handshake when she went back right before second semester started.

School started back with a bang, just like always but her suffering wasn’t over. Aunt Peggy came to visit in February when she went back to the mansion. Her dementia acted up and she forgot just who her goddaughter was and almost attacked her, thinking she was an enemy.

Annie sobbed for hours till the older woman, who Jarvis had to knock out, woke up and remembered. Peggy held her and apologized repeatedly but decided that she needed to leave and only keep in contact by phone. Her son, who Annie thought of as an older cousin, put her in a nursing home shortly after.

In April, almost a year to the day that Howard found out about Everett, Jarvis had a heart attack that put him in the hospital. He lasted long enough for her to come see him before dying in his sleep.

That night she sobbed, just as she had for her mother. To her, Edwin Jarvis was her father and he was gone.

The second she got back to MIT after the funeral, she threw herself into her final project, a functioning artificial intelligence. Three weeks later, two weeks before the due date, she brought JARVIS to life. The familiar British accent that she had been missing as if it were an actual limb, almost brought her to tears.

JARVIS made the tabloids go nuts and she, Rhodey, and Erik graduated easily. She spent the summer in Wakanda, only returning when she helped Mama Rhodes move into an old folk’s community in Florida.

She returned to the States for her birthday, just in time to send Rhodey off the basic training for the United States Air Force. That was when everything started going downhill. At eighteen, she wasn’t required to have a guardian and was now technically the owner of a billion-dollar company, even if she had no say in how it was run. Obadiah and the board still hounded her and pressured her in what decision she had to make.

It was too much.

She quickly started drinking and partying, dropping the name Annie and going by Toni, since Erik was right about it fitting her better. Thankfully T’Chaka and her family in Wakanda and Rhodey were too busy to see the tabloids that showed her at party after party. Half the shit they wrote was trash, but she did drink a little too much and made out with a few guys. She smoked a few times but that was it.

Till New Year’s Eve.

She had been at a party in New York City when her drink was spiked. She had recognized the wrong taste, even though she was already drunk and had left immediately. No cabs were around so she started walking back to her hotel till a thirty something year old man driving a cab found her and pulled her off the street, recognizing her.

He drove her to her hotel and helped her into her room before leaving. She woke up the next morning hungover and sobbing at everything she had lost.

She went to her mother and Jarvis’ graves and sobbed, recognizing that she was going down the same path Howard had, even though she swore she wouldn’t. She checked herself into rehab and spent a month getting all the toxins out of her system.

Two weeks after she got out, she tracked down Richard Parker’s brother and sister-in-law and told them everything. After some convincing, they let her see Peter.

The six-year-old boy recognized her in seconds, even after over a year of hardly any contact. He jumped into her arms and started talking a mile a minute while she fought off tears, seeing so much of Mary in him with a little bit of Richard.

May and Ben let her come over any time after that, which almost made her start sobbing hysterically at the fact they were letting her so close of Mary and Richard’s last living piece.

After meeting with them, she realized that she needed a bodyguard. She tracked down the cab driver who saved her ass on New Years and found out he was a former boxer and army veteran named Harold Hogan. Two days later, the recently nicknamed Happy Hogan started following her around. When Rhodey came home from training, before he left for his first tour, they met and started going over on exactly how to keep her safe.

For just a second, she wished Everett, who was in DC at the CIA, and Bruce, who had recently returned to Gotham City, were there but pushed it away.

Erik and T’Challa, who had declared themselves her older brothers, met Happy as well when she went to Wakanda for a quick visit. T’Chaka simply smiled at him in approval and Ramonda hugged him hard. Her adopted mother pulled her aside later and yelled at her for an hour about her party days which she had found out about on accident really but quickly forgave her after realizing why and begged her to call more.

In March of 2007, she finally told Obadiah off, with Happy at her side. She was tired of the old bastard pushing her around.

“Fuck off, Obie. This is my company and half these mandates are shit. I’m the Stark in Stark Industries now, not Howard. If you pulled this shit with him then he’s a bigger moron than I thought for allowing it. Clean up the act or get out.”

She introduced a new line of weapons and started the company branching off into different directions such as technology and humanitarian efforts. As she was only eighteen and not able to take over the company officially, she couldn’t do much about the weapon sales but planned to get them out of the business slowly.

The board wasn’t thrilled but they did agree with her designs and the company started thriving.

But it wasn’t enough.

Shortly after turning nineteen, alone in her workshop except with JARVIS and her bots, she decided something.

She decided to make her own company using her own fortune since SI wasn't officially hers yet.

In months, Stark Solutions was official and growing fast. She still did designs for SI in free time but focused all her energy in her own company till it quickly became a million-dollar business, all by the time she turned twenty.

In January of 2008, she went to Bern, Switzerland for a technical conference. The people in charge were stupid by doing it at New Years and offering drinks and having her speak on the thirty first.

Idiots.

Before her lecture, she met a neurosurgeon who would grow to piss her off constantly in the following years. Doctor Stephen Vincent Strange was a genius in his own field and only about three or four years older than her own nineteen years but apparently was so arrogant that he decided to critique her and claim she wasn’t seasoned enough be at the conference. She practically growled and told him that if he didn’t get head out of his ass and realize that she was probably smarter than him and everyone else there besides possibly Stephen Hawking, she was going to shove her stiletto so far up his ass he’d be able to taste her toe nail polish.

She left the annoying handsome doctor gawking as she pulled a laughing Happy away.

After her lecture on integrated circuits, she met Maya Hansen and Ho Yinsen for the first time. She blew off the latter to go meet with Hansen over an interesting treatment she was working on. That night is also when she met Aldrich Killian who she also blew off.

After almost fixing Hansen’s formula while drunk, she returned to the States, New York City and continued building up her company.

In early February of 2009, at twenty and months away from taking over SI, she realized she needed a PA and devised a test. She put all the candidates in her room and gave them a fake report with a math mistake that, if real could cause her company to lose several hundred thousand dollars and let them all look over it.

Only one utterly fabulous woman caught it.

Virginia Potts stormed in her office with the sheet and shoved it her face after threatening to pepper spray Happy. With the freckles on her cheat, and that performance, she left the room with a job and a nickname.

The spring and summer passed quickly till it was time for her birthday and the pinnacle she had been building towards. The pinnacle everything in her life had prepared her for, despite Howard’s attempts at roadblocking her.

It was time to take over Stark Industries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heads up, the timeline on this is a little different from canon. Toni is born in 1988 so I changed the events a little to make her younger when Civil War happens. I'll try to let you know the major things at the end of each chapter now that we are getting into canon.   
> Bruce cuts off contact in January of 2005  
> Howard & Maria are killed in December of 2005.  
> Toni graduates in late May of 2006.  
> She meets Happy on New Years 2007.  
> New Years 2008 is the Bern Conference that sets up the events of Iron Man (Iron Maiden in this case) 3.   
> She takes over SI in August of 2009.


	5. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Antonia: 21st birthday to Afghanistan and return

Toni turned twenty-one to a party grander than most.

The cake was taller than she was. Champagne and whiskey seemed to flow like a river and most of the guests were drunk before it was half way over.

Obadiah took her around the room, posing for pictures before T’Challa, Erik, and Rhodey rescued her, pulling her into dance after dance until her feet ached.

There were only two surprises she really cared for.

The first was T’Chaka, Ramonda, T’Challa, Shuri, and Erik showing up. Due to not many people knowing about her connections with the Wakandan royal family, they weren’t entirely sure whether they would be able to come. Obadiah had been one of the reasons they were there, and she sadly had to thank the old bastard for that.

The second was her favorite. She had been standing at the bar, a drink in her hand when a man in suit showed up. She had stared at him for a moment, trying to figure out who he was.

He had flashed her a small smile. “We haven’t met, Miss Stark. My name is Agent Phil Coulson.”

Her mind froze as she stared at him. “Agent?”

Could it be? Was he here?

He handed her a badge and she lit up seeing it was for the Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement Logistics Division.

Uncle Nick.

He gestured to a dark corridor off to the side. “He’s waiting for you.”

Smiling, she looked up and saw Rhodey staring at her in confusion. She mouthed ‘Nick’ which caused him to gape at her, eyes like saucers and his mouth hanging open.

Turning back to Coulson, she followed him down the hall into a private room, not caring if the sharks that called themselves journalists published stories.

They could go fuck themselves for all she cared.

He led her into a side conference room before leaving her in there with a dark man in a trench coat. His back was to her and he didn’t speak for several long moments. Her joy slowly disappeared as she grew nervous, terrified he would tell her that what she had done, what she was doing, was something that he wanted no part of.

That she was something he wanted to no part of.

“Almost all of Howard’s known enemies are dead.” He turned to look at her and she was shocked to see him with an eye-patch over his left eye.

He smiled, almost laughing despite himself at her dumbstruck expression. “It’s been a rough few years, Nia.”

She nodded dumbly causing him to laugh. He held out his arms and she didn’t anymore reassurance. She practically flew into his embrace.

She clutched the leather of his coat and buried her face into the black turtleneck underneath, breathing in the smell of gun powder and paper. His arms wrapped around her and he kissed her head in a way that no one had done in what felt like a life time.

“I’m only here for tonight.” He whispered in her hair. “It’s so close to being safe for us to be seen in public but not yet. It’s just another six months, Nia. I promise.”

Tears came to her eyes, but she pushed them back with a deep breath. Six months wasn’t that long to wait. She could do six months. She swallowed the lump in her throat and nodded.

Six months was almost easy at this point.

“You should get back to your party, Nia. Your guests will start to miss you and people may get suspicious.”

She squeezed him tighter before sending him a final smile and leaving the room. Coulson was waiting at the door and she silently whispered him, “Thank you” before leaving.

The second she got back to the party, a very familiar and irritating face greeted her. “Look at you, all legal and dolled up.”

She smirked at him and remembered her earlier threat. “You really want to taste my toenail polish, don’t you?”

Doctor Stephen Vincent Strange almost smiled as he held out his hand. “May I have a dance?”

Sadly, people were watching so she couldn’t say no. She cautiously took his hand and let him pull her on the dance floor.

He held her closer than most would consider appropriate, but she didn’t call him out on it as they swayed to the music. “You’ve done good, Stark. I must tell you that. I approve of the work your company is doing.”

She had done her research on him after their first meeting in Switzerland, so she knew him saying that meant more than most flattery, but she had to play him. “Which company are you talking about again?”

He rolled his eyes. “You know which one. You haven’t even signed the paperwork for Stark Industries yet.”

“Maybe, but everyone knows I’ve been practically running the company since I was eighteen. I had to, or else Obadiah Stane would run it into the ground.”

He froze at the mention of her unfortunate business partner. She looked him over as she almost brought their dancing to a halt. “What?”

Stephen sighed. “I seem to have this extra sense when it comes to picking at shady people and I’m normally not wrong. Mr. Stane has me on high alert right now, especially when it comes to you.”

That wasn’t really new information to her. She knew very well that Obadiah agreed with Howard about her almost engagement. He didn’t want her running the company, for several reasons that made her want to hit him with her stiletto.

He had been acting weird recently, more so than normal, but she wasn’t going to tell the doctor that. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

The music finished, and he started to pull back. “See that you do. For some reason, I don’t want you hurt and he seems to have the opposite as his agenda.”

She stared after him and moved to the desert table where Happy was, silently watching her the whole time except for her quiet exit earlier. “What did he want?”

She shrugged her shoulders. “I’m not sure.”

The next month and a half, after she officially moved to Malibu, seemed to not stop as she put all her time and energy into building her first official SI weapons line, the Freedom Line with the Jericho missile as it’s crown jewel. The board smiled at her like Christmas had come early when she presented it to them.

The only little free time she got was the day she went to Vegas to receive the Apogee Award. She had gotten so relaxed, more than she had in months, that she lost track of the time and forgot the ceremony entirely.

She would have to make that up to Rhodey later.

That night was when she also meant Christopher Everhart for the first time. She didn’t sleep with him, though she had thought about it. He was too smarmy and shark-like for her.

The next morning, she almost kicked herself for forgetting Pepper’s birthday to the point that she showed up on time for the plane. Rhodey had been pleasantly surprised, even more so when she didn’t request a glass of wine on the plane.

A bad feeling was making her stomach sick.

The demonstration went off without a hitch, making all the majors practically hanging off her as she left the site. Rhodey wanted to ride with her back to the base but she made sure not to let him.

She knew something was coming, something that she had to protect him from.

She was right.

Not even halfway to the base, the attack broke out. The morons in charge hadn’t even given her a gun so when the young soldiers that she had been with died, she had to run out unarmed into the open or risk dying in the car.

She ran behind a rock, sending JARVIS her location, just as a thud hit the sand beside her. All she could do was stare at the logo, her logo, on the missile before she ran back screaming.

But she wasn’t fast enough. The missile exploded, and she was sent reeling back into the sand with a ripped-up bullet proof vest and horrible pain her chest. For a second she thought she was dying and she was already planning on what she would say to her mother and Jarvis when her vision went black.

She woke up the first time in agony. Male voices were screaming around her as her eyes locked on to the sight of a doctor performing surgery on her fucking chest. A cloth was quickly placed over her mouth and the chloroform knocked her out as she saw something be placed inside her chest.

The second time she woke up, she was tied to a chair and sack was over her head, a sack that was ripped off to show a camera staring at her face. A man was standing next to her, reading off a piece of paper into the camera. Her eyes moved around and widened in utter terror as she saw at least a dozen rifles aimed at her head, inches away from her hair. When the camera shut off, she was almost thankful that one of the bastards hit her on the head to knock her out again.

The third time laying on dirty cot in a cave, her chest aching and her breathing labored. The doctor she remembered from the first time she was awake was shaving and giant circle was in her chest, attaching it to what she recognized as a car battery.

A fucking car battery!

“What the fuck did you do to me?” she hissed, glaring at the man.

He smirked. “I saved your life.” At her incredulous look, he explained about the shrapnel in her heart and the workings of the electromagnet.

Before she could ask anything else, more men entered the room with machine guns, guns that her name on them.

Her name! How?

They were followed by a truly repugnant man. He was speaking in Arabic, which Yinsen translated. She glared at him as held out a picture of the Jericho missile, the weapon she had built to shut the SI board up.

When he asked her to build it, what more could she do than to tell him to fuck off?

The bastard apparently didn’t like that, and she was dragged into another cave and forced in front of a tub of water. Repeatedly, she was asked to build the Jericho, repeatedly she refused, and repeatedly they dunked her head into the tub, almost drowning her every time. They only stopped when water hit the electromagnet, causing her to get fucking electrocuted.

For days the same thing occurred, and she kept refusing. That is, till they took her into another cave and started whipping and beating her. The memories of Howard came up the surface, causing her to drown in a different type of torture.

It took a week and a half before she finally folded, planning on dying before she gave them what they wanted. She was already dying from the shrapnel.

Yinsen was her only comfort, a man that she barely remembered from the conference where she met Strange.

Her mind pushed the doctor away as she tried to think up a way to escape, finally tired of sitting on her ass. She couldn’t do nothing! Rhodey was looking for her, she knew that. She guaranteed T’Chaka and Uncle Nick were doing their best to find her as well.

She wondered about Bruce and about Everett for just a second before pushing them away. She couldn’t dwell on them, not when she had so little time.

They were gone from her life anyway. As Yinsen said, she was the girl who had everything and nothing and she couldn’t deny or change that really.

All that mattered really was getting herself and Yinsen home.

The terrorists were apparently very stupid, giving her enough supplies for her to build the miniature arc reactor and the metal suit that she thought of in her mind. It wasn’t until Razza, the ugly son of a bitch, walked into the room and threatened Yinsen that she worried someone might catch on.

They spent the entire night finishing the suit, both nervous beyond belief. She barely had time to focus on anything else except the suit.

Though she did wonder why her stomach ached every time she looked at her fellow prisoner.

The suit fit her as well as it could for being metal deathtrap. The only problem was that it was taking too long. Yinsen saw this problem and decided to be a fucking moron and run out of the cave with a fire arm, leaving her screaming at him for being so stupid.

When the suit reached full power, she had more than a little fun attacking the torturing bastards as she tromped through the halls, calling for her ally

Her stupid and brave ally that she found dying on a few full sacks in one of the outer caves. She blasted Razza back with an explosion that she didn’t even have time to fucking relish.

She had no time, not with Yinsen so hurt.

She tried to drag him out of there, pleading with him before he finally informed her that the family he talked about returning to was already dead. Her mind flashed to the months after Jarvis’ death and when the hopelessness of losing everyone had overwhelmed her, so she stopped, knowing that there was no way she could change his mind.

He died in her arms, begging her not to waste her life, the second chance that he had given her.

She understood him and his yearning to die, but she didn’t forgive the bastards outside. They were to blame for his death, his family’s deaths, the Humvee soldiers’ deaths, and her torture.

They deserved to fucking die!

She went outside the cave and destroyed them, to vengeful to laugh at the fiery deaths she gave them and their screams. Some may call her a fucking psychopath, but honestly, they deserved far worse.

Her weapons blew up like fireworks, their flames reaching up as she blasted out of there, finally free after God knew how long.

Granted, she didn’t make it very far before she crashed into the unforgiving sand. She stared at the sun for the first time in months with an exhilarated smile, pushing past the grief on Yinsen’s death and focusing on the joy of her survival.

It took maybe six hours for a helicopter to be heard flying overhead. She dropped to her knees, laughing like a maniac as she caught sight of the Air Force logo on the side of it.

It hit the ground with a thud, barely landing before Rhodey, her beautiful and perfect best friend came running catching her as she stumbled into his arms. “Toni! Oh thank God, Toni!”

She clutched his military jacket, laughing and crying as she breathed him in, not giving a shit about the medic that was trying to look her over.

How could she when she was safe for the first time in so fucking long?

They got her back to base, barely able to look her over before she freaked out. Rhodey sent them away as she sobbed about the reactor into his shoulder. He calmed her before handing her his phone, so she could call JARVIS and tell him to make an appointment with Stephen Strange.

It was either that or no doctors period.

The answer was no doctors. Stephen was booked so heavily for the coming months that there was no way he could see her, even if she went to New York instead of Malibu upon returning to the States.

Toni understood but she couldn’t deny she was disappointed.

Her return to the State was somber as she stared at Pepper and Happy, the former looking like she was about five seconds from breaking into tears. Well, until she called for a press conference and demanded a cheeseburger after refusing to go to the hospital.

She had been in captivity for over three months, so she didn’t care what the red head wanted.

Rhodey, who had hitched a ride with them, handed her a new phone, complete with all her information and files. The first thing she did was call Ramonda who burst into tears at the sound of her voice. Erik, T’Challa, Shuri, and T’Chaka took turns stealing the communicator until she swore she would come visit as soon as she could.

First, she had a job to do.

Obadiah was waiting for her at the conference, ushering her out with a smile so fake it made her want to claw his eyes out. That urge disappeared when she saw his reaction to her little announcement.

The panic almost caused her to smirk in satisfaction.

Almost.

As she walked out of the building with a flabbergasted Rhodey, Pepper, and Happy at her side, she caught sight of familiar face.

Agent Coulson.

She sent him a smile before she lost sight of him. Hopefully he would assure her overprotective godfather of her well-being.

Her and her three friends got back into the car, Pepper and Rhodey practically yelling at her while Happy was just confused. Finally she got them both to shut up by opening the buttons on her blouse and showing them the reactor.

“One of my missiles went off and I got caught in the blast range.” She explained. “Those bastards had my weapons. They tortured me trying to get me to build the Jericho for them! Someone is double dealing and I will not allow my creations to be used for the very destruction I fight against.”

Pepper whimpered at the mention that she had been tortured. Happy looked like he was seconds from being sick while Rhodey just stared in horror. Hearing about it was one thing, seeing it was another.

She thought about going to SI, but she needed to go home first. First, she had Happy drop Pepper and Rhodey off and their expected locations before her driver and protector drove her home.

JARVIS greeted her with utter relief as she entered her mansion and made her way to her lab. The second she walked in, her three babies practically attacked her, clinging to her with their mechanical arms. She stroked their metal casings before moving to sit in her favorite chair, grabbing her phone and calling everyone she needed to.

Mama Rhodes was just as hysterical as Ramonda, as was May. Ben was relieved as he could be before Peter snatched the phone and started catching her up as much as she could. The young boy made her forget everything for just a few moments.

The second the boy finally let her go, she called T’Chaka on his private line. The king had been her source of guidance more than a few times since meeting him and she was desperately in need of reassurance after her announcement.

He was confused at first, knowing just how important the weapons industry was to her company before she explained everything about her time in Afghanistan, not leaving anything out. She also explained her fear that someone was double dealing under the table.

He was quiet for a while before sighing. “Antonia, I will not pretend that this choice and path will be easy for you. The situation is very familiar to Ulysses Klaw and the betrayal of my brother. I understand and am proud of your decision and will support you in it, but if you are correct about a betrayal, I am begging you to be careful. I will not have you hurt if I can help it.”

She understood, and she loved him for trying to protect her. After the loss of Uncle Nick and Jarvis, he had done his best to be the father figure and adviser that she needed. She knew he thought of her as a daughter, just as she thought of him as her father figure.

Adopted father, because, even after all this time, Edwin Jarvis was the real man that deserved that title from her.

She thanked him and let him go, leaning back in her desk chair with a sigh. Her gaze flickered to her boys who were playing in the corner before she looked up at the ceiling. “JARVIS did Rhodey tell you about what is in my chest?”

He was silent for a moment before answering. “Yes, miss.”

Toni smiled, of course her Rhodey would tell him. “I need a new reactor. The memories around this one is not ones I want to carry and it’s not going to help me much longer.”

If he had a body, she could see him nodding. “I will make sure the materials to make a new reactor and a spare will be here in the next few days. In the meantime, miss, it is probably best for you to get some rest.”

For once, she didn’t argue, allowing him to shut down the workshop as she walked out, making her way to her room. she changed into one of Rhodey’s MIT shirts that she stole when she was sixteen and climbed into bed, falling asleep in minutes.

She was beyond exhausted, but she was home. For the moment, that was all that mattered.


	6. Author's Note

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not a chapter, but please read! I have a few future options for this story in here that I need feedback on.

Hey guys,

So sorry that this is not a chapter. I am working on the next one but am super busy with college and a little stuck on how to write it. My mind is a total mess right now and my health isn’t exactly perfect either. The next chapter will be coming hopefully sometime in the next few weeks. I have spring break starting on March 15 so I will hopefully get some free time and a break from my eight classes and the massive research paper I am working on (Predestination vs free will in Oedipus the King (so fun!!!)).

That being said, I have a few ideas with future places to take this story. As you may have noticed, I am focusing on Toni’s perspective of the events and have only hinted at some major scenes. I hadn’t realized this was happening until I looked over it the other day. I don’t want to redo the story, considering that I am still working on doing that for some other stories of mine. I do want to fix this problem, so I have an option. Would you all want me to turn this into a series an I put those missing moments in a story of their own. This will include Toni’s meeting with Strange, some of Toni and Everett’s love story, and so on. If so, let me know in the comments below.

This story’s main relationship is Toni Stark and Stephen Strange. The romance is not the main part of this story. It’s my rewrite of Toni’s life if she were the soul stone. That being said, there will be background pairings that will show up later and I already know people will want to know more. This includes Peter Parker/Fem Harry Osborn, Bruce Wayne/Fem Clark Kent, Bucky Barnes/Ava Starr, and more. I also mention a very special crossover between Marvel and a certain movie musical that two actors from Marvel movies were in. Due to my love of said musical and the questions such a crossover can bring, I have chosen to add it by using one of the characters. To answer the questions and expand on the relationships and that crossover, I offer another story that focuses on just the other relationships. Parksborn is particularly cute from what I have in mind.

Again, just let met know if you want it.

Thanks for reading this and I hopefully will have another chapter up soon.

See you soon,

mitkit99,

PS (Neither of the crossover characters are on the Avengers in canon, though one is on another superhero team! The other is a character in the new Spider-man movies. I thought of making her be Peter's love interest but Parksborn took me by the heart and won't let go. I need to give my babies some happiness!!!)


	7. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Toni builds the suit, begins to unravel the plot within Stark Industries, and shares a dance with a certain someone before everything goes to hell.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, sorry this is late but I've been super busy lately. I've finished the second full semester of my freshmen year of college, am currently in Rome, Italy on a study abroad, and have been dealing with a lot of family and health problems. I also have a lot of other stories going on, especially Behind Iron Defenses over at my Wattpad account, that need updating. If anyone still wants the link to that, please let me know. I finished this chapter on a whim and may finish the next BID chapter on the 11 1/2 plane back to the States because I have learned I can not sleep on planes which sucks considering that my professors decided to drag me around all of Athens after the 10 1/2 plane ride a week and a half ago. I have no idea when the next chapter will be posted. Comment and let me know what you think so I can maybe get inspiration to write the next chapter sooner or you may not get it until after my 20th birthday which is at the end of the month.   
> See you later,  
> mitkit99,

It took two days for the materials to make the reactors arrived. It should have been half that time, but JARVIS made sure she had a few recovery days.

He was protective, and she loved him for it.

She spent the time in her lab, dressed in loose clothing and playing with the bots. Her boys had rushed to greet her, and she had spent hours playing with them.

At the end of the second day, she was sitting at her workshop table, looking over some plans for a new tech that she wanted to release, when her phone beeped.  She picked it up, surprised to see she had a text from one Doctor Stephen Strange.

_Are you okay? – Stephen_

The simple question made her smile. It sounded like he was worried about her, something a lot of people didn’t do, so she decided to answer him honestly.

_No, but I will be. – Toni_

And she would be, she always was. For some reason, she always ended up recovering.

It took a few minutes for him to answer her with another question.

_Do you need me? – Stephen_

There were so many ways she could answer that. She wanted to say yes, but that would mean admitting that the snarky doctor had wormed his way into her heart and she couldn’t do that. She had work to do.

Her sentimental side would have to wait.

She also didn’t want to answer with a no. For some reason, a part of her would not let her push him away, even though she should. It would be safer for him.

But she couldn’t do it.

_Not yet. – Toni_

She shook her head before leaving her lab. After taking a quick shower, she hopped in bed with her tablet and started checking up on Gotham.

Wayne Industries was booming, not that she expected differently. Bruce and Lucius were a brilliant team. They just were a little too reckless with their secret project.

Yes, she knew. How could she not? Bruce may be doing everything in his power to keep her out of his life, but she knew him too well, even if they hadn’t talked in five years. Just shortly after she last saw him, a masked vigilante showed up in Gotham.

It didn’t take a genius to figure out who Batman was.

She was surprised anyone else hadn’t found out. Bruce was using his companies funds for this and those records were public. How someone had not put two and two together, she would never know.

Reading over every article on the Batman, she simply shook her head. Alfred must be having a field day.

The next day, the materials arrived, and she delved into her workshop. With Jarvis’ help, she was able to quickly create a new reactor. Getting it situated in her chest was a different story, but thankfully Pepper had arrived earlier in the day to help her with that.

She would have to get the PA a gift for her help in that traumatic ordeal.

After the second arc was built and safely stored in her personal vault, she started working on the plans for the MARK 2 of her mechanical suit. She thought for a brief minute about including Rhodey but figured he was a little too busy considering her decision to take the company out of the weapons industry, even if he understood why she did it.

Speaking of that, Obadiah would not stop calling her. She had called him the first day after she got home and explained her decision and he decided to help and take care of the board, knowing she would kick him out if she had to.

He wasn’t going to give her an excuse to get rid of him, even if she wanted him to.

JARVIS was instructed to keep an eye on him for her though, so she pushed all thoughts of him aside and began to work. Slowly, with the bots help, she perfected her plans for the new suit and started construction.

Piece by piece, all of her time went into developing the armor. It would be her finest creation if you didn’t count JARVIS or her bots. She painstakingly worked on every little inch to make sure it was perfect.

And it was paying off.

Yes, there were a few times she was blasted into a wall or five and she may or may not have scorched the top of her least favorite car, but the inner workings of the suit were coming together. It was taking her a little longer and a lot more attempts, but it was worth it.

She just prayed she could get the suit finished before the Ten Rings and whoever sold her out could make their next move.

The only real time she took a break was to sleep, shower, and talk with Pepper and Obadiah who were pestering her about the stock drop. Fifty-four percent could be recovered, she had made sure of it when she took over the company. The plan was always to leave the weapons industry.

She just had planned to do it more gradually.

She sent them a few new specs for the technology aspect to shut them up. She did get an email from one of the Board meetings that Obadiah had attempted to lock her out.

_Bastard!_

She had JARVIS change his ringtone to the ‘My Little Pony’ theme song and made sure is was impossible for Stane to change it. She then had JARVIS start digging into every file on the SI servers.

She would find out who was double-dealing, no matter what.

It was the night after her original test flight, when she finally left the confines of her lab and the Malibu Mansion. She had flicked on the TV in her lab to see the Stark January Gala, the one her mother had started a few years before she had Toni, in full swing and snarled.

That party was her mother’s baby. She had never missed it.

And she wasn’t about to.

She left the workshop in JARVIS’ capable hands with orders for a new paint job on the suit before fleeing up the stairs to her bedroom. She quickly showered before throwing on a tulle high-neck red and gold gown and her favorite red heels and red rose earrings. She completed the look by twisting her hair into a partially up style, painting her eyes a shimmering gold, and coloring her lips into their normal crimson.

They were her classic colors that brought out her Italian features, or so claimed all of the gossip rags.

Like she cared.

JARVIS already knew what she needed, like always, had brought her black Maserati to the front, allowing her to get in it and speed off to the Gala.

She got their fashionably late, handing her car off to one of the many valets and stalked the carpet, smirking at all the surprised faces. Morons, this was her party now that her Mom was gone.

She passed a stunned Obadiah and gave him her shark like smile and fiercest glare before softening her eyes at the sight of Pepper and Happy waiting near the door, dressed in a stunning blue dress and midnight suit, respectively. Happy held out his left arm for her as she came by and led them both into the beautiful room. “I knew you wouldn’t miss it, Boss.” He whispered.

Pepper nodded. “We know how much this party means to you. Rhodey is stuck dealing with the brass but he apparently made a call to someone else.”

Toni raised her left eyebrow, wondering who it could be, before letting Happy lead them over to the bar. The bartender was already waiting with their glasses, thanks of Phil Coulson who was sitting at the bar. She pushed her friends to the dance floor before moving to sit next to the agent. “You need to de-brief me?”

He gave her the closest thing to a smile as he could give. “Technically yes, but he’s just worried. All these years, he’s tried to protect you and this time…”

“It’s from inside SI. I’m guessing Obadiah or one of the board members.”

Coulson nodded. “Good, that’s who we think is behind it.” He paused before handing over his card. “Call me when you can to set up a meeting and be careful. I don’t think Director Fury could take it if you got hurt.”

She smiled. “He has a wife and daughter. I guarantee Aunt Maria and Monica would murder him if he got too depressed.”

The agent smirked. “Too true.” He left then, allowing her a few moments of peace.

She nursed her drink, allowing the flavor of the martini to rest in her mouth, before she turned around, looking over the occupants of the room till her eyes froze on a single figure.

It had been two weeks since her return to Malibu and the press conference. Two weeks since she had sent that text and had resigned herself to not seeing him till her mission was done or at least close to being done. And yet, there he was, standing against the wall with a champagne flute in hand.

Rhodey and JARVIS were responsible, she knew it.

He gave her a small smirk before crossing the room, keeping eye contact the entire time till he was standing maybe two feet in front of her. “Miss Stark.”

She tapped her nails against the top of the bar. “Doctor Strange. I thought you were in New York.”

He nodded. “I was, but I had pressing concerns on this side of the country.”

She would deny the warmth that flooded her at those words. “Oh, really?”

His smirk grew as he held out his hand. “I know I’m just a simple doctor, but may I have the pleasure of a dance?”

She should say no, but she was weak, too weak to deal with his teasing and not respond. So, with a matching smirk, she took his hand and allowed him to pull her onto the floor, ignoring the concerned yet pleased looks from Happy and Pepper that she caught from the corner of her eyes.

She rolled her eyes. Nothing was going to happen, nothing could happen.

He pulled her close to him, allowing her to smell the hint of his cologne, before moving one hand to grasp her left and the other to grasp her waist. His grip was strong and steady, not too forceful but strong enough to let her know he was ready to catch her should she fall.

Yes, she knew how poetic and cheesy that was.

They danced gracefully for not only that song but several others. She could hear the murmurs of their onlookers, could feel the probing looks of all the other socialites and her few friends, but didn’t care. She kept her eyes locked on the brilliant cobalt blue eyes of the man in front of her for as long as she could.

Somewhere deep inside of her, something began to sing at the utter feeling of rightness that this moment gave her. That same thing seemed to make the entire room glow in a goldish-orange aura that she and all the others ignored.

Four songs after they started, he pulled her off the floor and into a dark corner. His lips parted as he opened his mouth to speak but she beat him to it, holding up a finger. “I know.”

“Do you need me?” he asked, a slightly pleading tone in his voice.

She bit her lip. “Not yet.” His gaze fell and she raised a hand to stop him. “Something’s wrong, Stephen. My kidnapping, the terrorists, the weapons, it’s all a part of some big game someone in the higher ups of my company is playing. I’m trying to stop it, to find the problem and end it, but I can’t do that if I’m distracted at all.”

Those blue eyes of his gained back their spark. “Do I distract you, Miss Stark?”

She smiled. “Why would I answer that and feed your ego?”

He shook his head. “You wouldn’t.” His gaze wandered for a moment. “Is Obadiah involved?”

“I think so. He attempted to file a motion to lock me out of the company. My AI is looking through his files as we speak.”

He raised his brow. “AI?”

Her lips curved. “Artificial Intelligence. I also have three robots.”

He smiled. “That is cool.”

She shrugged. “I’m a technology and engineering genius.”

Stephen nodded before pressing a quick kiss to her forehead. “I know, now go fix your mess. Call me when you finish, though. I have some vacation time that a friend is demanding I use soon.”

She smiled. “Maybe I can use mine at the same time. I haven’t been to Greece in a while.”

He grinned. “That sounds glorious.” Taking a few steps back, he started to leave, giving her a goodbye as he disappeared into the darkness. “Don’t take too long.”

She wouldn’t.

Toni sighed before straightening herself and moving back to the party, immediately coming face Chris Everhart and a stack of photos from Gulmira that changed everything.


End file.
